1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wire harness connector, and more particularly to a terminal retainer construction for fixedly anchoring in position the terminal members which are inserted into terminal compartments in a wire harness connector housing.
2. Prior Art
For fixing in position the terminal members which are inserted into terminal compartments in a connector housing, it has been the general practice to provide flexible or resilient retainer arms integrally on the inner wall surfaces of each terminal compartment, which retainer arms engage the terminal members upon insertion of the terminal members into the terminal compartments to prevent dislocation or dislodgement of the terminal members. Recently, a proposal has been made to provide a terminal retainer which is fittingly interlockable with a rear portion of the connector housing to prevent dislocation or dislodgement of the terminal members securely in cooperation with or in place of the flexible retainer arms.
FIG. 9 illustrates such a prior art retainer structure, which is provided with support projections d on the inner surfaces of opposing wall portions c of each terminal compartment b in a connector housing a. Tapered drive surface e are formed on the rear side of the support projections d, while temporary or provisional locking projections f and main locking projections g are provided in relatively rearward and forward positions on the outer wall surfaces with respect to the position of the housing a.
Indicated at h is a frame-like terminal retainer with resilient locking arms j and resilient retainer arms k extending forwardly from a frame body i respectively onto and into a connector housing a to be connected therewith.
The terminal retainer h is firstly joined with the housing a in a provisionally interlocked state where the resilient locking arms j are in interlocking engagement with the provisional locking projections f. In this state, the resilient retainer arms k are extended linearly forward without interfering with a terminal member l inserted into the terminal compartment b.
Nextly, the terminal retainer h is pushed in further to bring the retainer into a finally interlocked state where the resilient locking arms j are in interlocking engagement with the main locking projections g. In this state, the fore ends k.sub.1 of the resilient retainer arms k which are abutted against the tapered drive surfaces e are thereby bent inward to grip a terminal press-on wire portion m, and located behind support projections n and o of the terminal member l to prevent its dislocation in the rearward direction.
In the above-described prior art arrangement, the resilient retainer arms k of the terminal retainer h which stop the terminal member l are forcibly deformed against its resiliency and retained in the deformed state by the tapered drive surfaces e, and therefore they are apt to be fixed in the deformed state losing resiliency under influence of heat. Such a non-resilient deformation makes it difficult to extract the terminal member or to re-insert the retainer member due to the interference of the deformed retainer arms k with the terminal member.